SAN FRANCISCO / Schools chief decides against advising board / Her opinions don't help debate, they fan flames, she says

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San Francisco Unified School District Superintendent Arlene Ackerman gives her annual "state of the schools address," as other dignitaries attend the program at Tenderloin Community School.
10/28/04 in San Francisco
Darryl Bush / The Chronicle Ran on: 11-12-2004
Superinten- dent Arlene Ackerman is supported by a 4-3 majority on the deeply divided school board. Ran on: 11-12-2004
Superinten- dent Arlene Ackerman is supported by a 4-3 majority on the deeply divided school board. Ran on: 11-12-2004
Superinten- dent Arlene Ackerman is supported by a 4-3 majority on the deeply divided school board. Ran on: 11-13-2004
Arlene Ackerman, schools super- intendent, also got $800 a month more in housing allowance. Ran on: 01-21-2005
Arlene Ackerman Ran on: 01-21-2005
Arlene Ackerman MANDATORY CREDIT FOR PHOTOG AND SF CHRONICLE/ -MAGS OUT less

sfschools29_071_db.jpg
San Francisco Unified School District Superintendent Arlene Ackerman gives her annual "state of the schools address," as other dignitaries attend the program at Tenderloin Community ... more

Photo: Darryl Bush

SAN FRANCISCO / Schools chief decides against advising board / Her opinions don't help debate, they fan flames, she says

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San Francisco schools chief Arlene Ackerman, not usually one to withhold her opinions, is refusing to give the Board of Education her recommendations on two of the district's biggest issues -- which schools to close to bridge a budget gap and how to proceed when the court order mandating the current desegregation system expires.

"If I give my opinion, it will shut the dialogue down," Ackerman said in an interview Thursday. "The board needs to decide."

Ackerman said she was tired of having her ideas shot down by board members who regularly clash with her over policy and complain that her leadership style is autocratic.

"It's what I'm trying to do to get along," she said.

Her three critics on the board -- who voted against her recent salary increase to $250,000 annually -- countered that she didn't deserve the big paycheck if she couldn't guide the group through a year packed with gut- wrenching choices.

"You can't be in her position making the kind of money she makes without being willing to make these tough decisions," said Commissioner Sarah Lipson. "She's the expert, and we need to be getting our recommendations from the professionals."

The seven board members are elected and earn $500 monthly. They are charged with hiring and firing superintendents as well as setting major policies for them to implement.

Lipson said 2005 would probably be the hardest year so far for any of the board members. In the short term, the group must decide which schools to close to help eliminate a $10 million budget deficit for next year and cope with dropping student enrollment.

The board is considering a list of four schools and two preschools and will probably vote to close three to five of them when it meets April 26.

Ackerman's staff helped craft the short list by giving the board the names of all the city's public schools with fewer than 200 students and providing other statistics about them, but the superintendent has not said which ones should close. The board has whittled the list over the past few weeks.

Later this year, the board will decide what to do once the federal court order mandating the current system of assigning students to schools ends in December. The system gives all students a shot at the best schools regardless of where they live, but it upsets many families because some students are sent to low-performing schools far from their homes.

A committee of parents, teachers and others worked for a year to come up with three potential new assignment systems, and it was widely assumed that Ackerman would take those into account and make a recommendation to the board. But she has decided she won't play a part in the decision.

Commissioner Dan Kelly, a backer of Ackerman, said he didn't blame her for wanting to stay well out of the way of these tough choices.

"The superintendent is doing what she feels she has to do, faced with a board that's divisive and confrontational and second-guesses her," he said. "She's saying, 'OK, then I'm going to give you the information, and you make the choices.' "

Commissioner Jill Wynns, another supporter of Ackerman, said the superintendent was in a tough spot because the divided board had behaved incompetently lately.

Wynns said the board had drawn out the school-closure process, for example, by belaboring insignificant matters such as where on its agenda to hear a parent advisory group's recommendations.

"(Ackerman's) recommendation would have to be based on serious debate at the school board level," Wynns said. "She would have to have a sense of how the board wants to do this, and I don't think it's possible."

But to Commissioner Mark Sanchez, a critic of Ackerman, that's exactly why the board needs her guidance. She's the one who has the staff and the experience to make recommendations on such crucial matters, he said.

"I think that's definitely lack of leadership," he said. "If you pay somebody $250,000 a year, you should expect more."